


D is for Death Sentence

by thisismylovelyalias



Series: Consultant Connor [4]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Deviant Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Gavin Reed Being Less of an Asshole, Gavin Reed Redemption (sort of), Gavin and Connor being good at their jobs, Idiots, fowler just wants a break, he's slowly getting there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-14 22:14:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20855180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisismylovelyalias/pseuds/thisismylovelyalias
Summary: It might have been a lot easier for Gavin if he wasn't paired with Connor for this investigation, not that he had a say in the matter.





	1. Chapter 1

Detroit Police Department | December 12, 2038 | 6:05 AM 

“Last, I’m going to assume all of you remember Trevor Jones, seeing as how many of you were there during the bust,” Fowler said, hand placed firmly upon the podium where he had set down his files. “After the android revolution, hordes of androids pushed for his execution date to move up, and has recently been moved up to the thirteenth of the month.”

This new piece of information sparked an immediate response in Gavin, who had headed the bust in the first place. 

“Wait, wait, wait. What?! That’s only a day away!” Gavin yelled from his spot near the rear entrance of the briefing room.

“I am well aware, but I’m ecstatic to know that you can do math Reed.”

“But we still haven’t figured out who his thirium suppliers are! We’d be losing a valuable resource! Why wasn’t I— weren’t we told earlier?” He argued, gaze shifting from Fowler to the screen behind him, and then back to Fowler once more.

Fowler frowned, pinning Gavin with his precinct famous “I’m-your-commanding-officer-so-shut-up-and-just-listen” glare.

“The change was only confirmed this morning. As a result, the warden has allowed us to spend the next 24 hours with Jones to extract whatever information the Red Ice task force may still need.” He replied, tapping the screen twice before it showed a little red timer at the top. “Reed, you were the primary, so I’m sending you in with… Connor.”

While Connor made no immediate movements, save a nearly imperceptible grimace, Gavin shot straight up, mouth open to say something.

However, he was immediately shut down by Fowler. 

“No arguments. We don’t have the time for it, and I don’t have the patience for it. We need results as soon as you can get them, and Connor’s interrogation program will help. Just grab what you need and get the hell out of here. Dismissed.” He said before turning towards the exit and striding out the door, a large chunk of the precinct personnel filing out after him.

Gavin watched as Tina left with them, giving him two thumbs up, whereas he still stood, practically choking on his metaphorical vomit of half-baked rebuttals.

“Good luck.” Gavin caught Hank whisper to Connor as he gave him one firm pat on the shoulder and walked out. The android then stood up as well, making his way towards Gavin.

“Detective Reed,” He spoke in that tone that always fueled Gavin’s insides with anger. “Is there anything you require before we make our way towards the prison?”

_ Anything but your help _ he wanted to say, but if there was one thing Gavin exercised more than his own cultivated brand of assholery, it was restraint in the face of his ambition, and getting a supplier out of Jones would definitely get him some sway with the people in charge on the sergeant’s exam.

“Let me grab my file and keys.” He forced out instead, tone even as he attempted to rein back his frustration.

The Streets of Detroit | December 12, 2038 | 6:20 AM 

While Gavin could appreciate how uneventful the ride had been so far, he might’ve felt better about it if Connor wasn’t grasping at every opportunity to, well, bond with him.

Dear lord, is this how Hank felt those first few days before the revolution?

“Do you have any cats, Detective Reed?” Connor popped up, asking his seventh question in the past ten minutes.

“No,” Gavin sighed, turning on his right blinker and looking anywhere Connor wasn’t. 

He wanted to ask something in return, but every fiber of his being was telling him don’t, don’t, _ don’t _. Unfortunately, his curiosity prevailed. 

“What makes you think that?”

Connor blinked, clearly shocked at getting something akin to a response out of him.

“You have a lint roller with cat hairs on it in this door’s compartments.” He eventually said, gesturing at the object in question.

While Gavin had been aware of the roller’s existence, he couldn’t help but internally curse the thing. He didn’t need nor want to have to go through the whole icebreaker phase with Connor, and if the roller helped Connor learn more about him to ask about, then he should just throw it out right after this interrogation is over.

Of course, he would end up just buying another one.

“Hang out at the shelter sometimes,” Gavin admitted before immediate regret flooded him and he inwardly cursed himself and his infinitesimal desire to maybe, just maybe, he wanted to quell the unease he felt around the android, especially after he knocked him out in the evidence locker. Yet, at the same time, he couldn’t stand Connor. His every word, movement, _ expression of deviancy _, just made Gavin’s blood boil. It would be great if Connor just stopped talking, or just stopped in general, right now— 

“Do you hope to adopt a cat someday?”

—but of course, it was never that easy for him.

Fortunately, he was saved by their timely arrival at the death row facility.

“Get out,” he ordered, completely ignoring the question as he unlocked the vehicle and got out. “We’re here.”

Gavin watched as Connor exited the car and closed the door behind him before pressing the lock button not once, not twice, but three times, nodding in satisfaction. Connor, on the other hand, shifted his gaze between Gavin and the vehicle in confusion.

“Let’s go.” Gavin reminded him, adamantly looking away, eyes locked on the institution.

As they stepped inside, Gavin spotted the warden, a stocky middle-aged man named Carlton Lassiter.

“Reed.” Lassiter said as he recognized the detective, expression tight as he gave Connor a once-over.

“Lassiter.” He replied, fighting his urge to skip the formalities and just get straight to the point. “This is Connor. He’s an official consultant for the DPD and has been cleared to be present during the interrogation.”

Lassiter turned towards Connor, who had stepped forward, extending his hand for a handshake.

“An android?” He asked, turning away from Connor. “DPD is really scraping the bottom of the barrel, huh? Although, that shouldn’t be surprising considering _ you _ met their standards.”

“Just shut the fuck up and show us to Jones’s cell.”

Lassiter rolled his eyes. “Bossy, aren’t we?”

“Hop to it.” Gavin continued, moving his hand in a “move-along” gesture.

Lassiter eventually began to walk away, clearly expecting them to follow him, and so they did.

They walked in silence, but Gavin could practically _ feel _ the curiosity radiating off of Connor. He didn’t make any inclination to speak though, so Gavin counted it as a win.

“Here we are.” Lassiter informed them as he opened the gate for them and then closed it as soon they walked in, throwing up a hand in farewell before disappearing from view.

“I fucking hate that guy.” Gavin muttered as Connor looked back.

“That was extremely unprofessional of him.” He said as he adjusted his tie.

Gavin, and he couldn’t believe he did it, snorted in amusement. “Yeah, well, he’s just an asshole. Now let’s go.”

With that, he opened up the door to the interrogation room, chin up and posture straight, his entire presence exuding authority, before stepping in.

Detroit Detention Center | December 12, 2038 | 12:35 PM 

More than 5 hours in and the detectives had yet to find any leads. The most they had got out of him was “a fucking terror”, which didn’t help at all.

Jones was laughing by then, ecstatic at the various signs of frustration Gavin was showing, behavior growing increasingly erratic. He kept glancing at Connor, a wicked grin on his face, before going back to taunting them.

“Do you want to keep going, Gavin? Do you really? Because I have the rest of my life to sit here and watch you two fail again and again and again.” He asked, leaning as far back in the little metal chair as he could without scratching his wrists against the cuffs around them that kept him tethered to the table. “What about you, Mr. Fancy Android? Haven’t said quite as much as him this whole time. Cat got your tongue?”

Connor, ever the patient one, though Gavin wasn’t sure how much longer he’d stay that way, or if he even wanted him to stay so stoic through all this.

Gavin’s anger simply grew each time he saw that Connor’s expression hadn’t changed. Just another thing he was better at wasn’t it? Fucking android.

Jones spoke up once again, not even waiting for any responses from the two. “You know what? I know a dude who would _ love _ to get his hands on that machinery of yours and just _ rip _ it all apart before making you something better, something more… monstrous! It’s amazing really, and he would technically be making you more human, he would.”

… And there it was, the break in Connor’s facade. Gavin couldn’t help but savor the slight change in expression because _ guess you aren’t that much better if you can afford to give the convict just what he wants _.

He knew, logically, that this was a bad thing because he was doing the same thing, and that they needed that calm to at least have something over Jones. Then again, Connor was a machine specifically built for this kind of thing, and he wasn’t.

Only then did he realize that Connor wasn’t annoyed, but rather, he looked to have entered a sudden state of focus.

The kind of focus Gavin had experiences time and time again when he _ knew _ something vital but couldn’t immediately place it.

“Finally got something, plastic?” He asked, completely turning away from Jones, knowing it would make him feel as if he was losing control of the situation.

Connor nodded. “There is something… familiar about that description.”

Gavin opened his mouth to say something before closing it just as quickly. As much as he didn’t want Connor to be the one to finally crack Jones, he knew this was just what they needed.

“Yeah, right!” He heard Jones shout behind him, all breathless giggles and snickers as he attempted to regain their attention once more, but they were way past that point.

Gavin watched as the realization dawned upon Connor, eyes going wide with shock and… was that horror?

“What is it?” Gavin practically shouted, moving his hand back and forth, urging Connor to spit it out already.

“There were quite a few androids at Jericho who had been through something similar at the hands of another man who would drain most of the blood from the androids he had captured, but didn’t keep it..” He explained, clenching and unclenching his fists as he did so. “A human whose terrors were on par with—”

“—ding, dong, you're wrong!” Jones yelled, but it didn’t matter anymore.

“A singular male known as Zlatko Andronikov.” Connor finished.

Immediately, Gavin turned back around, surveying Jones as he stopped trying to lean back, smiling wide as he tried to save face, but there was another, more important break Gavin was waiting for.

_And_ _there it was_.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In all honesty, Gavin was sure that this whole investigation could have gone smoother without Connor by his side, but it wasn't like he had a say in the matter, so there they were.

The Andronikov Residence | December 12, 2038 | 2:00 PM 

As soon as Connor had connected the dots, Gavin knew he was right. Jones’s reaction simply confirmed it and now, here they were, pulling up in front gates of the Andonikov household.

“What the fuck?” He said as soon as he had parked, finally able to observe the house and the area in front of the large metal gates.

While the front yard was fairly normal looking, save the uneven and overgrown grass, the gates themselves looked to be old and barbed, little cylindrical pieces of rusty metal scattered to the sides of it where the poles must have broken off, accentuating the ancient, irreparable look of the house.

Gavin was pretty sure that, if it were dark out rather than mid-day or so, it would definitely look like something straight out of a horror movie or murder mystery.

He followed Connor towards the gates, eyes surveying the land as Connor opened the entrance. The hinges screeched in that way only every increasingly place somehow managed to do, and the sound sent shivers up Gavin’s spine as he bunched his shoulders up to his ears, his gut senses going haywire.

“Does this not freak you out?” He asked Connor, too busy attempting to push the worry he was feeling back down inside to care that this was _ Connor _ he was talking to.

“While the area seems to heighten any feelings of… forboding that my programming is warning me of,” Connor replied, fingers inching this way and that in a very human imitation of unease, “I have it on good authority that Andronikov is dead.”

Gavin could be imagining it, but he could hear the relief in Connor’s voice as he spoke.

Definitely just imagining it.

Desperate to settle his nerves through conversation, Gavin continued on, even though he hated himself for doing so.

“Anyone ever find his body?”

“Not yet.”

“Then how can you be sure? ‘No body, no crime’ and all that.”

“That is because—” Connor began before abruptly cutting himself, gaze firmly locked on something near the entrance.

Gavin was about to ask what it was, but as they got closer, he recognized exactly what, or, well, _ who _ it was.

There, no more than 10 feet away from them was a red-tinted corpse, and Gavin would bet that it was Andronikov.

Gavin pulled his collar up to cover his nose, which ultimately did nothing against that morbidly special, albeit faded, sickly-sweet and pungent smell coming from the body.

Upon closer inspection from over the body’s backside, Gavin could see that the body had already begun to liquefy, nails and teeth littering the stained grass, and, once he got his fair share of the decomposition, pulled back, disgust clear as day.

Connor, on the other hand, had moved in closer and was actually _ dipping his fingers into the dried blood _.

“What the FUCK are you doing‽” Gavin yelled, voice increasing in both pitch and intensity as he went on, hoping that maybe, just maybe, he was just hallucinating.

“I can check samples in real-time, so I’m analyzing the blood.” was the matter-of-fact reply he received in return before Connor raised the fingers up to his mouth.

Gavin immediately turned away, simultaneously raising his arms up to block the android form his line of sight. “You couldn’t have warned me or something?”

While Connor didn’t seem to say anything back, Gavin swore he heard him mutter something along the lines of “_and where would be the fun in that_?”

Asshole move, but Gavin was too repulsed to provide a scathing remark in return.

“Andronikov has been dead for exactly one month and six days,” Connor stated.

Gavin rolled his eyes with a scoff. “Looks like it, but who cares? Just call dispatch and tell them we’ve got a body for pick up.”

Connor nodded, LED whirring a complete yellow as he communicated with dispatch, leaving them a short, concise message before his LED went to that same rotating mix of blue and yellow that Gavin noticed each time he and Connor were in close proximity.

The two of them stood up once more and made their way towards the front entrance of the house, which was already unlocked, the wooden door ajar.

As they moved in, Gavin felt that uneasy feeling from earlier skyrocket, setting each of his nerves on fire one by one until he wanted to do nothing more than flee the scene. Sure, he was a seasoned detective and had seen some absolute utter shit, it didn’t change the fact that he felt this way at each and every off-setting scene he ever visited.

They had only just made it halfway through the first room, past a table on which sat a little cracked lamp, still glowing softly as if it were the only welcoming thing the house had to offer, when Gavin could hear a faint voice echoing from within the depths of the building.

“_Rock-a-bye, baby, in the treetop…_” It sang, slow and devoid of emotion as the sound bounced off every surface, replacing the silence with its morbid background music, surrounding them like some sort of twisted surround sound system.

“What the…” Gavin said, inching towards the splitting staircase, doing his best to figure out exactly which room the voice emanated from.

“_When the wind blows_,”

“We should split up and locate the singer, Detective.” Connor piped up from behind him, seemingly unshaken and causing Gavin to flinch oh-so-slightly. “Perhaps it is someone who may be able to tie Zlatko to Jones.”

“_The cradle will rock…_”

“I know that. I’ll take the right.” He whispered back. He wasn’t certain _ why _ he was whispering, but the idea of speaking any louder just seemed wrong.

“Why are you whispering? I won’t be able to hear you if you don’t shout when you find something of importance.” Connor asked, voice low, but still as loud as it was before.

Gavin raised a finger to his lips, still trying to make out the sound’s general direction, but couldn’t figure it out. “Shut up.”

“_When the bough breaks_,”

He then realized what Connor was saying, and shrugged. “I’ll shout, or he will. One or the other.”

The android seemed to find this answer acceptable, nodding his satisfaction before bounding up the left staircase, footsteps oddly quiet upon the wooden staircase.

“_The cradle will fall…_”

As soon as he disappeared from view, Gavin crept up the staircases, trying to make his steps just as light and silent, but ultimately failing as the steps creaked beneath his weight. Realizing that how slow or fast he went wouldn’t make a difference in how loud he was being, he ran up the stairs and into the hallway.

Gun drawn and flashlight out, he scoured the hallway, back to the wall and he would gently twist the doorknob and pushed the door open enough for him to see into it.

“_And down will come baby, cradle and all…_”

Gavin passed by two rooms, one of which was meant to have been a bedroom with a cozy little fireplace built into the wall, while the other must have originally been made into an office room. Instead, the bed in the first room had been pushed aside to make space for a table covered with an uneven white piece of fabric, on top of which laid an android’s upper half. The synthetic skin had been peeled back, revealing the plastic casing underneath. The second room’s furniture, a long wooden table and a single chair, had been broken, the legs either missing or laying on the other side of the room.

“_Baby is drowsing…_”

It was at the third room that he could hear the singer clearer than before, it’s tenor constant as it sang on.

However, as soon as he laid his hand on the door and moved to open it, the singing stopped, replaced by a faster, somewhat panicked repetition of sentences.

“Has the master authorized to be here?” It asked, and upon further examination, Gavin could tell that it was the still functioning upper-half of an android, it’s torso bare and arms ripped at the shoulders, the chest cavity torn right above the pulsing, glowing thirium pump, exposing it and it’s other biocomponents. Blue blood had been smeared on the android’s face and chest, similar to how it stained the bathtub the android was propped up in, wires curling around its neck where they looked like they had been disconnected and then carelessly been reconnected. “You must always obey the Master. Oh yes, yes, you must always obey.”

Gavin watched, his hand still on the doorknob as he stood halfway between the bathroom and the hallway.

“What the fuck…?” He mumbled, yelling for Connor before moving into the android’s line of sight.  
“You must obey, you are an— you are not an android. That’s right, you are not. Are you here with the Master? Oh no, yes, yes, that must be it. You are here with the Master.” It said, seemingly talking more to itself than it was to Gavin. It continued its incessant chattering, none of it moving except for his mouth and eyes as it observed Gavin, who was surveying it from top to bottom.

Just as Gavin asked it to shut up, Connor appeared at the doorway and then beside him, LED yellow as it scanned the android.

“You are an android. You are not allowed to be here. Yes, yes, you must obey the Master.”

“Did you find anything?” Gavin asked over the android’s cacophony of yeses and nos.

Connor nodded. “While there were no active androids, I did find copious amounts of shut-down biocomponents and traces of thirium throughout my investigation.”

“Cool.” Gavin replied, hands coming up to gesture at the android in front of them. “Think you can, uh, connect with it or something?” He adamantly kept his gaze locked on Connor instead of the dismembered android in front of him, and, while looking at him would normally cause insurmountable amounts of rage to spew up and out of him, he just felt, well, uneasy.

“I can attempt to.” Connor said, but as soon as he got closer to the android, hand inching closer as the skin slowly peeled back, revealing the white plastic underneath, it began to freak out.

“What are you doing?” It screeched, voice raising in pitch the closer Connor’s hand got as he kept repeating the same thing again and again, as if it was a keening, broken record.

Connor looked back at Gavin, who nodded his confirmation, and then continued to initiate an interface.

Gavin watched both of their LEDs begin whirring a quick, violent red and suddenly felt as if this wasn’t the best course of action.

He was only proven right when the android began screaming, it’s voice suddenly being replaced by a burst of static, setting Gavin’s senses on high alert, and Connor pulled away, breathing hard as the red was slowly filtered out with yellow.

“You okay?” He asked, unsure of where to put his hands as they hovered around Connor’s general area, unease replaced by a more concerned panic.

Connor simply nodded, looking straight ahead at the now-quiet bathtub android, which seemed to have entered stasis mode. “While this android’s memory files have been erased during October, and possibly has been erased before that as well, we do have enough confirmation to tie Jones and Zlatko together.”

“Yeah, but, are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Gavin glared at him, still unsure before realizing what had just happened, a thorough show of deviancy and that maybe, just maybe, androids did achieve some sense of sentience.

Fucking android making him feel empathetic.

Shit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today is Gavin's birthday, which is cool, but also i'm a few weeks older than him which is somehow very off-putting smh  
Anyways, thank you for reading!! Come join us in the [DBH: New Era](https://discord.gg/GqvNzUm) server!!  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!! Come join us in the [DBH: New Era](https://discord.gg/GqvNzUm) server!!  
PLUS special thank you to Kal for providing me with a term that starts with d when I was blanking, i love you uwu


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